A photo widely circulated on social media purporting to show Metallica singer James Hetfield posing beside a slain bear has been revealed as a picture of someone else entirely.

The photo, showing a hunter crouching beside a dead bear, was shared and circulated on Facebook and Twitter among activists protesting Metallica's billing at Glastonbury.

Hetfield's love of hunting and his role narrating a new History
channel documentary, called The Hunt, has angered animal rights
activists who say it contradicts the ideals of the music
festival.

Doug Giles pictured with the bear he shot - the photo has been incorrectly circulated as that of James Hetfield

The photo was actually taken in June 2010, but has been used on social media to try remove Metallica from festival

The picture is actually of Doug Giles, a hunting enthusiast from the US, and is of himself with a Brown Bear he shot in Prince William Sound, Alaska, in June 2010.

'It's hilarious,' Mr Giles told MailOnline. 'You'd think protests to be a little bit more stringent in their protesting.

Hunting enthusiast Doug Giles has been vocal in his support of Metallica's right to play at Glastonbury

'I don't think I look like [Hetfield] at all, I don't have tattoos up and down my arms. People went nuts, man. I don't know if they're high or what but they started attributing that to Hetfield.

'I don't know who switched it from me to Hetfield, but one of the big US outlets . . . They too were wrongfully attributing my incredible bear picture to Hetfield's hunting prowess.'

He was also vocal in his support for Hetfield and Metallica's right to remain as the headline act at Glastonbury.

'What he does is legal, what he does is what the planet has done since Adam and Eve. Now they want to ban [him], because his pursuits don't happen to line up with their cause, which I think is b******t.

'It's just irrational. I would just love to talk to anyone, anywhere, anytime about hunting and its part in conservation.

'But I don't know what is going on about the Glastonbury dudes and dudettes.'

Hetfield is the narrator of an eight part History Channel documentary which follows a group of hunters in search of the Kodiak Bear in Alaska.

Mr Giles lamented the modern state of rock 'n' roll and questioned when it had turned into a 'b***h and moan festival' when groups had to be approved by some 'stupid, dirty, hippie behind his keyboard'.